About guydauncey

I am a speaker, author, activist and futurist who works to develop a positive vision of a sustainable future and to translate that vision into action.
I am founder of the BC Sustainable Energy Association, co-founder of the Victoria Car Share Cooperative, and the author or co-author of nine books, including the award-winning books Cancer: 101 Solutions to a Preventable Epidemic and The Climate Challenge: 101 Solutions to Global Warming. My latest book is 'Journey to the Future: A Better World Is Possible' (December 2015). www.journeytothefuture.ca
For my sins, I am also an Honorary Member of the Planning Institute of BC, a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts, and a Fellow of the Findhorn Foundation in Scotland. My main website is www.earthfuture.com. I live at Yellow Point, near Ladysmith, on Vancouver Island, BC, Canada.
View all posts by guydauncey →

What is Happening?

What on Earth is happening? The explosion of housing prices in Vancouver and Victoria is crazy, but the same thing is happening in many cities around the world, not just the big ones like Toronto, London, Berlin, Paris, Stockholm, New York, San Francisco and Mumbai but also smaller communities like Kelowna, and Nashville, Tennessee. In Australia, in 2014, house prices rose by a whopping 121%.[i]Continue reading Canada’s Housing Crisis: Twenty-Two Solutions→

Like this:

The most difficult challenge facing humanity is not devising solutions to the energy crisis or climate crisis or population crisis; rather, it is bringing stories or narratives of the human journey into our collective awareness that empower us to look beyond a future of great adversity and to see a future of great opportunity. What visions of humanity’s journey are sufficiently compelling to transcend age-old differences and bring us together in a common venture of inhabiting the Earth in ways that are sustainable? ~ Duane Elgin, NewStories, Great Transition Stories

Do concerns about the future we are leaving to our children and grandchildren leave you with a worried taste in your mouth, after even the most delicious meal? Let me come to your aid with these tasty offerings. You can choose one, two, or better still the whole lot, since they will hopefully lighten the weight of your worries.

How do we tackle the climate crisis with the speed and resolution that the climate scientists say is so urgently needed?

How do we make a rapid transition to a 100% renewable energy economy in a positive, nation-building manner, without causing economic mayhem, unemployment and chaos?

It’s complicated. There’s no doubt about it. Our economy is completely enmeshed in fossil fuels. We use fossil fuels to travel, to heat our homes and buildings, to generate electricity, to power our industry, to make plastics and to pave the roads. If fossil fuels were to magically stop working due to a zombie-ray from outer space or an unexpected change in the laws of physics, our economy would grind to an immediate halt. Continue reading Let’s Get Going – Climate Action Together→

Like this:

Can we live without the tar sands, the oil and gas pipelines, the oil tankers, the fracking and the coal-fired power? Can we live without our gas-heated homes and factories, and our oil-powered planes, ships, trucks, trains and automobiles?

They are all part of the fossil-fueled economy, and as such they are essential.

By Guy Dauncey

New Scientist magazine reported in June that five meters of future sea-level rise is already locked in, due to the steady collapse of the West Antarctic Ice-Sheet. If we don’t act rapidly, their staff reported, it will be twenty metres.

The full extent of the flooding will not happen for several thousand years, but “locked-in” is the phrase they used.[1] Venice, New York, Miami, San Francisco, Vancouver, London, Mumbai, Kolkata; large parts of Holland; a large part of Bangladesh and many cities in China—all will be under water.[2]

by Guy Dauncey

Is It Really True?

Is it really true that if we don’t build more pipelines and allow more exports of coal, oil and gas, that Canada’s economy will be in danger and unemployment will rise?

That’s certainly what we are frequently told, both by the Conservative federal government and by several provincial governments, either directly or by implied assumption.

There is alternative, however. The climate crisis is inescapably real. It threatens everyone’s future, and it is being caused by carbon emissions from the same fossil fuels that our governments want to expand.